THE PRESIDENT: Thanks for the warm welcome. I really want to
thank the good folks of the New Britain General Hospital for putting up
with me and the entourage. (Laughter.) But thanks for letting me come
to talk about some important issues facing America.

I'm on my way to Maine, where I'm going to spend the weekend with
one of my favorite seniors. (Laughter and applause.) He is turning 79
today. I'm not going to tell you how old my mother is, because I want
to have a place to sleep. (Laughter.)

Thanks for giving me a chance to come down. We face big challenges
in this country. We've still got a challenge of making sure the nation
is secure and the world is more peaceful. Even though we've been
successful in two major battles in Afghanistan and Iraq, there is
still an enemy who lurks, who hates America because of what we stand
for. And we stand for freedom. That's what we believe. We believe in
freedom to worship, freedom to speak, freedom to succeed. And those
freedoms are dear to our heart.

But people don't like the fact that we stand for freedom and
promote freedom. And, therefore, they're out there. But we'll find
them and we'll bring them to justice. There's no greater job for an
administration than to protect the security of the American people.
And that's precisely what this administration will continue to do.
(Applause.)

And we have got a challenge when it comes to quality health care
for our seniors. We face a challenge because many seniors face the
high cost of prescription drugs. It's a challenge we've got to deal
with here. Today I'm going to act on how to speed up the approval of
generic drugs, to make sure that prescriptions are more affordable for
all Americans, particularly our seniors.

We also face a challenge because the Medicare system is
antiquated. Medicine is modernizing and Medicare isn't. And that's
not right for our seniors. And so I've come here today to remind
Congress that Congress has an obligation and a responsibility to meet
the needs of our seniors, and to make sure that Medicare is modern.

And there's no more strong advocate for making sure Medicare meets
its promises than Nancy Johnson. She is a tireless advocate for
quality health care all across America. And I want to thank her for
her leadership. And I want to thank her for her friendship. And I
want to thank her for her introduction. (Applause.)

I was a governor once, so I got to know the governors -- the
nation's governors. And the state of Connecticut has got a great
governor in John Rowland. (Applause.) He's been dealt a pretty tough
hand this last year, but he's playing it like a pro. And the citizens
of this state are fortunate to have him here. (Applause.)

I want to thank the mayors who are here. The best politics, of
course, is local politics. I want to thank you all for coming. I
appreciate you taking your time out of your day for coming.
(Applause.)

I met Ruth Campanario when I got off the chopper. And you probably
say, why would you mention her? Well, there's a lot of focus on the
great strength of America these days. They talk about our military
might, and we're plenty tough if we have to be. They talk about our
muscle, but the true strength of the country is the heart of the
country because of the compassion of the citizens who live here.

And Ruth is a volunteer, she volunteers at the Friendship Service
Center. It's a local shelter that offers emergency and transitional
housing and job training and counseling services. She takes time out
of her life to try to make somebody else's life better. That's the
strength of America. It's the willingness of people to serve something
greater than yourself, to love a neighbor just like you'd like to be
loved yourself.

So, Ruth, I want to thank you, and thank all who volunteer to make
their communities a better place. And thank you for coming. Where are
you, Ruth? Oh, there you are. Stand up, Ruth. (Applause.) Thank
you, thank you very much.

Our health care system is the best in the world, and we need to
keep it that way. We're great because we've got great docs. We're
great because we've got unbelievable research, new technologies that
literally save lives on a daily basis. I mean, we're really good at
health care. But we've got problems we've got to deal with.

And one of the problems is the cost of prescription drugs. We live
in an age of miracle drugs. Millions of our citizens have found
healing and hope from medicines that were discovered and created in
this country, and it's -- but the treatment, the use of drugs has
replaced major surgeries, as well. Treatment is changing. And this
has been a blessing. It's been a blessing for a lot of seniors who are
living longer and better lives.

But the challenge for America is to make sure that life-saving
drugs are both affordable and available to America's seniors.

Now, one way to make prescriptions more affordable is to ensure
that generic drugs are not delayed in reaching the market, are not
delayed for consumers to be able to purchase. In our system, when a
drug company develops a new medicine, the company is given a patent.
And patents ensure that investment and innovation are rewarded, so we
continue to get additional life-saving drugs as new discoveries are
made. It makes sense to have a system that protects investment, for a
while.

Yet, when a patent expires, other companies have the right to make
a safe, lower cost generic version of the drug. However, the system a
lot of time doesn't work because the original inventor of the drug uses
delaying tactics to avoid competition. They delay the process of
patent expiration so that consumers don't have additional choices of
generic drugs.

At my direction, today, the Federal Drug Administration, the FDA,
is taking action to close loopholes that slow the movement of generic
drugs to the marketplace. First, we are limiting the amount of time
that a drug company can delay the marketing of a generic competitor.
Instead of letting them file one delay after another, the government
will allow a single 30-month stay while legal complexities are sorted
out. In other words, the initial manufacturer of a drug will not be
allowed to use the legal process for endless delay, which hurts our
consumers in America.

Secondly, we are no longer allowing drug companies to block
generics because of patents on minor features, such as the color of the
pill bottle, or some combination of ingredients not related to the
effectiveness of the medicines. Thirdly, we are tightening the overall
rules on patent applications so that false statements to get a patent
result in criminal charges.

By taking these actions, we will bring generic drugs to the market
much more quickly -- in some cases, years earlier. And this should
save the American consumers about $3.5 billion each year -- savings
that will go, of course, to the consumers, to our seniors; or to
Medicaid programs administered by the state; or to employer health
plans.

The Senate is looking to write these reforms that we're now
implementing to executive action in the law. And I support their
efforts. I want to work with both the House and the Senate on this
legislation to make certain that prescription drugs are more affordable
to the American people.

And then we've got to deal with the issue of accessibility for our
seniors. People on Medicaid, Medicare need to have a choice of
affordable plans, all of which provide prescription drug benefits.
Every federal employee -- including every member of Congress -- gets to
choose the health coverage that best fits their needs. If it's good
enough for the employees and the members of Congress to have choice,
it's good enough for our seniors to have choice when it comes to health
care plans as well. (Applause.)

And so here are the choices available. If a senior wants to stay
in the current Medicare system they should have that option. And that
option should include a prescription drug benefit. (Applause.) If
seniors want to have enhanced benefits, such as more coverage for
preventative care and other services, they ought to have that choice,
as well.

And, finally, seniors who like the affordability of managed care
plans should be able to enroll in managed care plans. They shouldn't
be starved to death so seniors don't have that option. And low income
seniors should receive extra help in meeting whatever plan -- the
premiums of whatever plan they choose so that all seniors will have the
ability to choose a Medicare option that includes the prescription drug
benefit. (Applause.)

These are the principles on the legislation that Nancy and I are
working on. And these are the principles that we believe will be
incorporated in the bill, so long as you let your senators and others
know that you're interested in reform, that you want a modern Medicare
system.

Sandra Sorensen -- I just met with some of your fellow citizens
from the area, all of whom are seniors. I listened to their stories.
Let me share some of the stories with you. Sandra Sorensen is here.
She is on a Connecticut special program called ConnPACE, a program
that, Johnny, you probably helped design. It helps her on her
prescription drugs.

The problem is, is that she wants to move up to be with her
daughter in New Hampshire. Her daughter is worried about her at times,
I guess is the right thing to say, Sandra, kind of worried about you.
She wants you to make sure that, you know, that you're well taken care
of. She wants to be close by. The problem is, if she goes to New
Hampshire, she looses ConnPACE, which means she won't have the
medicines necessary to take care of her current ailments. We need to
reform Medicare to make sure people have got the capacity to go from
one state to the other without losing prescription drugs. (Applause.)

The Rowlands are with us today, Ralph and Bernice. They were quite
outspoken about the need to make sure the Medicare system works
properly. Ralph was wondering out loud, how come Medicare doesn't try
to prevent disease before it happens? That seems to make sense.
(Laughter.) It doesn't. They pay now about $200 a month, and what
they're worried about is increasing drug costs will make it very
difficult for them to live out their older years.

The Humprhreys are with us, as well. Ginny spent her time working
in the Connecticut health care system. She knows a lot about health
care. She claims she had a stroke, but it's certainly hard to tell
it. She's very articulate. But she understands -- and she likes
Medicare+Choice, but she sees that Medicare+Choice is slowly getting
starved in the budgets of the federal government. The plan also
doesn't have a drug coverage. They spend about $1,000 each month on a
variety of medicines. They need a modern Medicare system so they can
live out the rest of their years in comfort.

Lois Splain is here with us. She likes Medicare. She likes being
able to choose her doctor without a referral. But she needs coverage
for prescription drugs. Hilda Gandara is here from -- Cuban American
is with us. And she is -- lives in West Hartford. Unfortunately, she
lost her husband recently. She's on her own, like a lot of seniors
are. Her costs are -- drug costs are about $700 a year. She's worried
about whether or not she can afford prescription drugs.

There's story after story after story all across America about
people wondering whether or not they can afford life-saving drugs in
their later years. And the Congress must act. That's what the
Congress must do. The Congress must understand we've got a problem
with Medicare. They should not politicize the issue. They ought to
focus on what's best for our fellow Americans and get a package done.
And the House needs to get it done, and the Senate needs to get it done
prior to the 4th of July break. (Applause.)

One of the important parts of a good health care system is the
relationship between patient and doctor. And any good health care
policy must recognize that relationship. But we've got a problem in
America that is affecting the relationship between patient and doctor.
And that is we got a medical liability system that is out of control.
If we want affordable health care and available health care, we got to
make sure that junk lawsuits don't run docs out of business and run the
cost of medicine up so high that people can't afford medicine.
(Applause.)

And it's an issue -- it's a real issue all across America. And if
people in America don't think their bills are being affected by these
frivolous lawsuits, then they don't really understand the system, in my
judgment. The cost drivers are high. Not only are docs having to pay
higher and higher premiums, I suspect we'd find some pretty good
testimony right here. I heard it yesterday from a baby doc in Chicago
whose premiums, annual premiums are $170,000 a year. He anticipates
they'll go up 40 percent next year, and he's never been sued.

The other cost driver is preventative medicine. If there's a -- if
people are filing lawsuits right and left in our society, which they
are, it's natural that a doctor or a hospital will want to practice
more medicine than is necessary to be able to defend themselves in case
they end up in a court of law. And that's expensive.

This is a federal issue, in my judgment, because of the costs of
litigation -- how it affects the federal budget. It affects the cost
of Medicare. Lawsuits affect the cost of Medicaid. It affects the
cost of veteran's health care. It is a national issue that requires a
national solution. And that national solution says people ought to
have their day in court. But junk lawsuits make it harder for somebody
who's actually been hurt to have their day in court. It also
recognizes bad doctors need to be punished; something good doctors
fully subscribe to. It recognizes that people ought to be able to
recover their economic damages, but there needs to be a hard cap of
$250,000 on non-economic damages. And we need to make sure that we
have a reasonable cap on punitive damages.

This is a necessary part of health care reform. It is necessary to
keep docs in business. It is necessary to keep consumers in a position
where they can have affordable and available health care. The House
has passed the bill. The Senate needs to pass the bill. And if you're
interested in medical liability reform, you ought to contact the United
States senators from the state in which you live and let them know your
opinion. (Applause.)

I believe we can get things done in Washington, D.C., if we
remember whose time we're on. We're on the people's time in the
nation's capital. (Applause.) We spend -- we're there to get the job
done. By working together, we can make sure this country is more
secure and, I believe, the world more peaceful. And by working
together, we can make sure that our folks have got economic security
and, as importantly, health security.

I want to thank you for giving me the chance to come today to talk
about an exciting opportunity for those of us who are honored to serve
the American people -- the opportunity to bring Medicare into the 21st
century, so we can look our seniors in the eye and say, we were called
to solve a problem and by working together we were able to solve that
problem, not only for this generation, but for future generations to
come.